A Thousand Rooms of Dream and Fear Read online

  2468 10 97531

  First published in Dari (Afghanistan) under the title Hazakhana-e khwab wa ekhtenagh

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher's prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition, including this condition, being

  Addresses for companies within The Random House Group Limited can be found at:

  'Fuck your father!'

  Before falling asleep, I must cross my arms over my heart and recite one of the ninety-nine names of God one hundred and one times. Al-Ba'ith, one. Al-Ba'ith, two. Al-Ba'ith, three... My grandfather used to say that Da Mullah Saed Mustafa told him that by reciting the ninety-nine names you can tame all the creatures in a nightmare. Al-Ba'ith, four. Al-Ba'ith, five. Al-Ba'ith, six . . .

  Nothing but darkness. Am I still dreaming? Al-Ba'ith ... how many? Dream within dream! Al-Ba'ith . . . Nightmare within nightmare! Al-Ba'ith . . . Blackness within blackness! Al-Ba'ith . . .

  'Get up, Father!'

  Yes, I have died and I've been buried too. I've been buried in the family vault. Perhaps, who knows, I've been buried next to my grandfather. Or perhaps next to a child and his mother. Da Mullah Saed Mustafa used to say to my grandfather that when the deceased is interred in the grave, he first meets those people buried next to him, then the relatives who died shortly before him. Who knows? Maybe my grandfather will come to see me. He will come. He's bound to come and say, 'So now you believe everything Da Mullah Saed Mustafa said! Didn't I warn you about the terrifying black-faced angels Da Mullah Saed Mustafa said descend upon the depraved alcoholic when he dies? And the words of the angel of death who commands the deceased: "You cursed soul, leave this body and flee to your wrathful God!"? This angel then pierces the soul with a spear that, since the beginning of time, has been tempered in fire and brimstone, making the soul skitter about like a drop of mercury. But nothing can escape the angel of death. The other angels arrive to haul the soul up to heaven. God orders them to write the sinner's name in the list of the damned. Then He sends the soul back down to earth to rejoin its corpse. After that, the two interrogating angels, Nakir and Munkar, visit the grave to question the sinner's soul: "Tell us the name of your God? What is your religion? Who is Mohammed?" The corrupt soul replies "I do not know" to each of these questions. So God tells his angels: "My creature lies. Light the flames of hellfire beneath him, and prop the gates of hell wide open so that the fearsome heat will burn him!" And then the gravestone he lies beneath begins to press down on his chest so his ribs are all crushed together . . .'

  'Oi! Don't you understand? Come here!'

  against the light. But I opened them quick at the sound of his voice. 'Name!'

  'Stop!'

  No, I am not dreaming. I am not trapped in a nightmare. I am not lost in Barzakh. I am alive and I am awake! Look, I can take the glass from the woman and drink this water ... I can feel the water coursing through my body. I can feel my burning throat, my aching bones ... No. This is not a dream. I can clearly make out the slim face of this woman, the dark hair veiling her profile . . .

  Al-Mumit. Al-Mumit ...

  The child strokes my forehead. I can see him. He's smiling at me. And suddenly, I want to laugh too - laugh at how helpless I am, laugh at the angels ... at the djinn . . . 'Yahya, come inside!'

  Where have I been? Perhaps I've lost my memory! It's not unknown for someone to suffer from amnesia after an accident and to have no idea of who he is or where he comes from. To completely forget his wife, his children and his home ... his mind a blank sheet, wiped clean of any familiar names or identifying details . . .

  'Yes ... I was out late. After curfew. I was on my way home... I've caused you so much trouble . . . I really should be going now.'

  'Farhad ... I just wanted to say that I have no desire to put your life in danger . . .'

  I wish that Mahnaz - for all her extraordinary kindness and generosity - were merely a dream. I wish that when I open my eyes, I'd find myself in my room at home, watching dawn break on my mother's lined face as she whispers a prayer above my head, while she wafts the fresh morning air over me ... I wish she were holding me tight . . .

  I trawl the blank white walls of the room searching for a photograph of his father. On the windowsill, next to the candle-stub, are two large books with gold inlaid covers. I take down both of them. One is Haft Paikar and the other Khosraw el Sheerin. I put them back on the windowsill.

  The child has caught me in his dream. I am a dream-creature. I am an imaginary father, an imaginary husband ... So why bother going back to my life?

  'I have no idea! I keep asking myself that, too. All night I've been thinking about everything I've done in the past couple of days - and nothing can explain it. I'm no rebel; I've got no connection to the resistance, to Jihad, or to revolution ... I was hanging out with a friend who was having to get out of Kabul. After we parted I was simply walking back home. Sure, it was late, well after curfew, and the night patrol caught me. But it was nothing, nothing serious . . . The only thing I can think of is that I made the mistake of calling an ordinary officer "Commander" - and that he thought maybe I was making a fool of him . . .'

  I'd gone to the university library to take out the Book of Shams, but the librarian told me someone else was reading it. So I borrowed another book and, having given it a quick glance, sat down. At the far end of the table was a young man wearing a pair of dark glasses. His head was buried in a book and he looked as though he wanted to devour every word. Since it happened to be the one I was after, I sidled up to him and coughed, so politely that even I could barely hear myself.

  The same day, in the university cafe, I found the scribe of the Book of Shams. We chatted together over a cup of tea. His name was Enayat.

  At the mention of my name, as always, Safdar's brother stops kneading the dough, and his sweet voice calls from the far end of the bakery, 'Last night the sound of Farhad's chisel never reached us from Mount Beysitoun . . . It's into the dreams of Sheerin that Farhad now has gone . . .'

  If Enayat's brother hadn't killed himself, maybe he'd have turned out like Yahya's uncle. A young man with no youth. With no soul. A body suspended between two arches. I do not want to see what Enayat's brother and Yahya's uncle have seen. No! I do not want my mother to put her breast in my dry mouth for me to suck her blood; or like Enayat's mother, to cry over her own son's empty grave ... I want to stay alive. 'My mother's here!'

  'One day grandmother said that you had died in Pul-e-Charkhi ... but she can't say that any more, can she, if she sees you're alive?'

  'In your eyes, in the things you say, there's a secret that I see in my mother's eyes ... a secret I've never . . .'

  'I've caused you so much trouble ... I hope that . . . Yahya's grandmother . . .'

  'And now my husband's family want me to marry my brother-in-law . . . But that's not what I want ... I keep telling them I don't feel as though I'm really a widow. No one has seen my husband's body . . . since, in prison, they bury the dead in unmarked, communal graves . . .'

  She takes another step away. Her whole body is shaking under her veil. She moves into the corridor. She searches for her shoes. I stand there, lost, like a button dropped on the black and red patterns of the carpet. Yahya and Mahanz come out of Moheb's room. My legs won't move. Without a look, without a smile, my mother says to Mahnaz, 'God be with you ... May God reward

  'Father!' ... ?! 'Father!'

  'But where are your family?' I ask her.

  My sweating face trapped inside the carpet heightens its smell. Such
a familiar smell. The smell of our front room. Parwaneh used to play marbles on the black patterns of this carpet. Farid used to race his matchbox cars along its black lines ... It was the best carpet in the house -my mother's dowry, given by her father to take to her new husband's house.

  Hash fumes and mocking laughter spiral above my head. Someone in another group calls out, 'From the ranks encircled of noble men: he who resists . . .'

  '... Joseph said to his father: O Father, I dreamt that the sun, the moon and eleven stars prostrated themselves before me.'

  '. . . In the tale of Joseph and his brothers can be found many signs of divine wisdom to aid those in search of truth . . .'

  '. . . With Joseph intent on escape and Zulaikha intent on holding him fast, they both ran towards the door when suddenly Zulaikha's husband appeared. She cried out to Potiphar: Tell me how you will punish one who wishes to bring harm to your household! Does this crime not merit imprisonment or torture!'

  A Thousand Rooms of Dream and Fear is set at a time of acute political upheaval in Afghanistan. In 1973 Mohammed Daoud Khan engineered a coup that overthrew the constitutional monarchy and inaugurated the short-lived Republic of Afghanistan (1973-1978). However, Daoud Khan's rule was marked by corruption and instability and, when the formerly faction-ridden leftist parties overcame their differences to oppose his regime, political chaos and violent state repression ensued.

  The Soviet Union became increasingly concerned at Amin's burgeoning power and his anti-Islamic stance; they were convinced the latter was exacerbating political unrest, particularly in the countryside, and they allegedly advised Taraki to get rid of Amin. But the attempt to have Amin assassinated was a failure, and instead Amin seized power on 14 September 1979. Taraki was killed in the violence (supposedly smothered to death with a pillow). Although his death was first announced in the Kabul Times on 10 October, there were conflicting reports of the actual date he was murdered.

  Though the narrator of A Thousand Rooms of Dream and Fear makes few overt references to the political situation in his country, it informs the whole novel. It is also assumed that the reader will understand the powerful social prohibitions that Farhad is breaking by being alone with a woman who no longer has a husband, and that Mahnaz is challenging by allowing her hair to be seen uncovered.

  The title The phrase 'a thousand rooms' is a direct translation of a Dari expression that can also mean 'labyrinth'.

  The epigraph Shams-e Tabrizi was a thirteenth-century Sufi mystic who was the close companion of the great Persian poet Mawlana Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi (1207-1273), usually known as Rumi in the West. Shams was responsible for initiating Rumi into Islamic mysticism. After Shams's sudden disappearance in 1248, Rumi's grief and deep devotion to his friend found expression in his Diwan-e Shams-e Tabrizi [The Book of Shams of Tabriz) in which, as a sign of his love, Rumi attributed his own words to Shams. Poetry, especially that written by Rumi, has the highest possible status and importance for the people of Afghanistan.

  Babur The descendent of Timur (Tamerlane the Great) founder of the Timurid dynasty, Zahiruddin Mohammed Babur (1483-1530) made Kabul the capital of his empire. He was famous for the beautiful gardens and vineyards he planted throughout Kabul, many of which remained until the city descended into chaos during the civil war. After capturing much of present-day Afghanistan, Babur turned his attention to India, where he established the Mughal dynasty. But he never lost his affection for Kabul, and his body is buried there, in Babur's Gardens.

  Bagh-e-Bala The summer palace of Abdur Rahman Khan (Amir of Afghanistan from 1880-1901) was set on a hill to the north of the city, with a magnificent view over Kabul. In 1979 it was a place where young people would go to drink and hang out.

  Barzakh The period between death and final judgement when the fate of the soul remains undecided.

  Book of the Dead Abu Hamid Muhammad ibn Muhammad al-Ghazali (1058-1111) was one of the greatest Islamic theologians and philosophers of the Middle Ages. He was known in the West as Algazel. A Sufi mystic, his great work The Revival of the Rehgious Sciences made Sufism an acceptable part of orthodox Islam. Published in forty volumes, the final part, On the Remembrance of Death and the Afterlife, is commonly known as the 'Book of the Dead'.

  Dervish A Sufi ascetic and mystic. Traditionally, dervishes practice austerity and live a life of poverty and prayer, much like Christian mendicant monks. Like monks, some live in orders and others are solitary. The great Sufi mystic poet Rumi was the founder of the most famous order of dervishes, the Mevlavi, well-known for their 'whirling' dance, through which they attain ecstasy and spiritual insight.

  Hafiz Mohammed Shams al-Din Hafiz, or Hafiz of Shiraz (1325/6-1389/90) was one of the greatest lyric poets of Persia. A Sufi mystic, he had a profound influence on poetry in Persian and Arabic, especially for his mastery of the ghazal. Goethe was very affected by Hafiz's poetry. Hafiz was famous for his poems extolling alcohol as a means of attaining spiritual insight.

  Haft Paikar A book written by Nazemi Ghanjavi (c. 1141-1209) who is widely regarded as the greatest romantic epic poet in Persian literature, who introduced colloquial language and a degree of realism to the Persian epic and whose works form an integral part of the culture of Iran and Afghanistan. Haft Paikai [Seven Portraits) is the story of the Sassanid king, Bahram-e Gur, who discovers a mysterious room in his palace that contains the portraits of seven beautiful princesses. He goes in search of the princesses, each of whom represents one of the seven virtues.

  Khosraw el Sheerin (see Haft Paikir) A book by Nazemi Ghanjavi. Sheerin (?-628) was the Christian wife of the Persian Shah, Khosraw II. She was first immortalised in Persian poetry by Firdausi in his epic, the Shahnama. Around 1180, Nazemi retold the story, emphasising Sheerin's love for the master builder, Farhad. Khosraw was so jealous of their love that he tricked Farhad into constructing a tunnel under Mount Beysitoun; he then lied to Farhad, telling him Sheerin was dead, a He that caused Farhad to fall from the mountain to his death. As a result of Nazemi's work, Sheerin and Farhad became symbols of pure, unrequited love. Their plight is recounted in many poems, including Goethe's Westoestlicher Divan.

  Nafil Practising Muslims are obliged to pray five times a day. These prayers are called: 'Fajr' (at dawn); 'Dhuhr' (at mid-day); 'Asr' (in the afternoon); 'Maghrib' (at sunset); 'Isha' (at night). 'Nafil' is the name for an additional, non-obligatory prayer, which can take place at any time.

  Nakir One of the two angels who are assigned to interrogate the dead before judgement day.

  Ninety-nine names of God Also known as the ninety-nine attributes of God (Asma' Allah al-Husna). According to Islamic tradition, Allah has ninety-nine names, each one representing one of his divine qualities. Repeating the names of God is a sacred practice, much as Roman Catholics will recite a litany of the names of saints. In this novel, Farhad recites the names Al-Ba'ith, meaning 'the resurrector', Al-Jabbar, meaning 'the irresistible, the powerful' and Al-Mumit, meaning 'the bringer of death, the destroyer'.

  Munkar One of the two angels who are assigned to interrogate the dead before judgement day.

  Pul-e-Charkhi Literally, 'the bridge that spins around'. A large pentagon-shaped prison near Kabul with a fearsome reputation for torture and murder. It was built in the 1970s during the regime of Mohammed Daoud Khan and is still in use today.

  Shah-Do-Shamshira Mosque One of the most important shrines in Kabul, marking the burial sight of an Islamic commander who was said to have fallen in battle against Hindu forces, even though he had continued fighting with a sword in each hand after his head had been cut off.

  Tomb of Sayed Jamaluddin A striking landmark in the grounds of Kabul University with huge black marble columns. The campus of Kabul University was built in 1964 with the assistance of the US under Mohammed Daoud Khan.

  Table of Contents

  Start

 

 

  Atiq Rahimi, A Thousand Rooms of Dream and Fear

  Thanks for readi
ng the books on GrayCity.Net